I See Fire
by authoresskika
Summary: "If this is to end in fire, then we should all burn together." (In Panem AU)


**Disclaimer: The characters of _The Hunger Games_ belong to Suzanne Collins. The lyrics to _I See Fire_ belong to Ed Sheeran. I've simply used both to tell a story.**

**Enjoy.**

* * *

_—_

_Oh misty eye of the mountain below_

_Keep careful watch of my brothers' souls_

_—_

She doesn't have much to show for the couple of hours she's been out in the woods today. She tucks her bow under her arm and replaces the arrow in her quiver as she walks the remaining distance to the spot… Their spot.

Not that they're actually friends anymore.

She breathes deeply through her nose, relishing the pungent scent of pine in the crisp autumn air. If Peeta weren't so lead-footed, she'd bring him out here with her. He'd be more than useful in hauling back the big buck she had to give up on, knowing that there'd be no way she'd be able to get it back inside the District in one piece. It killed her to have to let it go; they would have gotten just as much for the hide as they would for the meat at the Hob.

But even if his tread were lighter, Peeta's down in the depths of the mines. Maybe Sunday…

"Thought I might find you here," a familiar voice says. Her spine stiffens and she turns, shooting a death-glare at the source.

"Are you here to arrest me, Mr. Mayor?" Katniss says, her voice icy.

"Knock that shit off, Catnip," Gale replies. Any lilt in his voice is gone in an instant. "You knowI'd never report you."

She seriously doubts that. "I don't have a decent haul anyway," she says, holding up her nearly-empty game bag.

"Nothing's out today."

"Did you check the snares?"

She scowls at him. She doesn't want to admit that the snares don't seem to yield anything decent anymore. Not since that spring day six months ago when Madge Undersee became Madge Hawthorne, and Gale Hawthorne became the Mayor-presumptive when Ulysses Undersee retires at the end of the year.

He doesn't ask to sit down next to her—he simply does. The air is thick and toxic between them. More than before, Katniss wishes Peeta were here to diffuse the situation. Peeta Mellark has always been able to put Gale Hawthorne in his place.

"Heard you and Mellark put a formal request in at the Justice Building," Gale says. "I suppose that means congratulations are in order."

She doesn't respond. It's none of his business. And at least she's marrying Peeta for the right reasons.

"How's he taking the work down in the mines?" Gale presses. "I ran into Thom the other day and he said he's pretty good on the crew. Guess he isn't as soft as I always figured Townies were."

That's none of his business, either. And he's got a pretty rich fucking mouth to imply something about Town folk, considering where he hangs his hat at night now.

"Look, Katniss, once everything is official, you have to know that I'm going to make some changes. I'll have the power to do that, you know... Make something good out of all this mess."

She stares at him, unblinking. Another time and place, she'd have believed him. Now the only person she believes in is Peeta. And that was hard won. She still isn't sure how Peeta did it, other than by sneaking up on her. But now she can't imagine life without him, and that terrifies her.

"How's the littlest Hawthorne? Still growing?" she spits. "Madge looked positively glowing the last time I saw her walking around. You'd almost suspect that little bastard was actually wanted between the two of you, and not just an accident behind the slagheap."

Gale's cheeks color with repressed rage. "Don't do this, Katniss. We never did this, not you and me."

She gets to her feet and crunches the leaves underfoot as she stalks away from him.

"Katniss!" he calls after her.

"Just leave me alone, Gale. Leave us both alone. And we'll do the same."

—

_If we should die tonight_

_Then we should all die together_

_—_

_He's not supposed to be home already_, she thinks when she sees Peeta milling about the tiny kitchen. A putrid, wafting scent infiltrates her nostrils as soon as he turns to her and opens his arms. She presses her face into the crook of his neck, then steps back, horrified. The smell is in his clothes.

"It wasn't that bad, I promise. There was just a little leak and I helped Thom plug it up, but they had to send us home early, just in case..."

"A petroleum leak?" Katniss snaps. "A petroleum leak isn't serious to your foreman?!"

"Katniss, we got it controlled fast," he says, reaching out for her hands. "It's not... Hey, stop. What's wrong?"

It's the first that she realizes she's sobbing. Her chest quakes and heaves against his sturdy, solid form as he crushes her to him. His fingers knit into her hair and massage at the nape of her neck.

"Shhh," he whispers. "It's okay, I promise."

It's all anything but okay. He doesn't belong in the mines, but that's the price he paid for loving her. Maybe Gale does belong in the Mayor's mansion, but not in the way he got there. Nothing will ever change, not really, no matter how many promises Gale makes, or how much Peeta loves her. The only thing Katniss can feel is numbness and fear, even when she's cradled in Peeta's arms and he's playing with her hair.

_How is anyone supposed to live like this?! _she thinks bitterly.

He's opening his mouth to say something she's sure is meant to be soothing, but his words catch at the back of his throat when her hands fly to the clasps of his mining coveralls and wrench them open. She wedges her hand inside, her fingers trace down his hard stomach, trail through a thatch of hair below his navel, and none-too-gently, she grabs ahold of him. She pivots so she's perched on the counter, then wraps her legs around his hips, drawing them together. She crashes her mouth to his and charts the inside of his mouth with the tip of her tongue.

"Katniss!" he groans against her lips and ministrations of her explorative fingers. "W-We're supposed to be w-waiting until..."

She doesn't want to wait. She doesn't want to think about Gale and Madge, or mining accidents, or even her mother and sister walking through the door and catching them. She wants what only Peeta can give her, and then she wants so much more.

She convinces him silently with her eyes searing into his. Their hands begin to pry at the clasps of their clothes; when Peeta grunts in frustration over the stubborn button fly of Katniss's trousers, she feels an incredible surge of warmth between her legs at the sound. When they're both bare, save for the flimsy material of her bra that he just can't seem to exactly master, Katniss scoots her hips to the edge of the counter and pulls him closer. He has himself in his hand, and now that he's fully erect, Katniss can't help but gape at his largeness and wonder how he'll possibly fit inside her.

"We don't have to," Peeta says, his voice pained but patient.

"I want to," she tells him, her voice tremulous but certain. "Just, slowly?"

He nods, kisses her, and positions himself at her entrance. It burns at first as he pushes between her folds, then a surge of actual pain rips through her core as he plunges deeper, then stills. She thinks he must be buried in her to the hilt. A quick look down signals that that isn't even partially the case, but still, he doesn't move. She realizes how stiffly she's holding herself, and wraps her arms around his neck to kiss him and melt into his embrace. The deeper their kisses become, the more she can feel him sink inside her. Finally, he pries his lips away with his forehead pressed to hers, and says, begging, "Please, Katniss, I need to move. I need to feel you."

She nods, and lets her eyes flit downward again, watching them come together as he begins to roll his hips. Her insides are still stretching, getting accustomed to his girth and length, but as he moves inside her, she begins to feel the tiniest bit of her own pleasure. It's not hot and intense, like she'd heard a crude boy in school talking about once, but slow and measured, like the tiny bubbles at the bottom of a pot of boiling water. His lips are exploring her neck and shoulders as he moves, his hands cupping her rear and kneading her flesh, and the noises coming from his throat—those are Katniss's favorite thing. She responds with one or two of her own, and feels him push inside her quicker, deeper; he must like them just as much.

It's too soon when he gasps that he's about to come, and they pull apart so he can turn away from her and spill into his discarded shorts instead of inside of her. Her cheeks are hot, every inch of her skin feeling as though it's about to catch fire, but she can't help feeling just the tiniest bit cheated that he gets to make such luscious, guttural noises when she doesn't. He turns back and slumps against her, right as she feels a not-unpleasant soreness blooming between her legs. His palms gently cup her breasts through her bra, his lips find her pulse points again, and the little bit of bitterness she'd felt washes away. She doesn't regret it like she wondered if she would when the time came. His skin is soft and dewy with sweat, even the patches that still smell of gas and are stained with coal dust. She thinks again that his skin should be dusted with flour, not coal, and that there really is only a matter of time before he remembers that, too.

"I think it's supposed to feel better for you the next time," Peeta whispers, his face buried in her hair. "I'm sorry it was so, ah, quick."

She shakes her head and kisses his temple, his jaw, finds his mouth and claims it roughly. "Come sleep in my bed with me? I don't care what my mother says. We'll be married soon enough, and I hardly think it matters now, do you?"

His grimace seems reluctant, but he doesn't put up much of a fight. Since he'd come to stay with them when his own family had kicked him out, disowned him forever, he'd been sleeping on a lumpy pile of ratty blankets next to the living room hearth. He insisted upon it, and Mrs. Everdeen had seemed pleased for him to do it. Ever since, Peeta has been a little too eager in Katniss's mind to please her mother, often to the point of annoying her.

"Until you fall asleep," he says, tucking a lock of her hair behind her ear. "And we should probably put our clothes back on, don't you think?"

His clothes are too soaked with the smell of gas, his underwear with the sticky mess that had come out of him with those last few clumsy pumps of his hand, so he finds other clothes to change into while Katniss plunges the entire lot into a sink full of freezing water while a kettle boils on the stove. He comes back to help her, insisting that when they're married, he can wash his own uniforms so she can focus on things like her hunting. They'll take care of each other, look out for each other, they agreed on that.

When they've hung his coveralls, shirt, underwear, and socks by the fire in the living room, she pulls him by the hand to the bedroom she shares with her mother and Prim. They'll surely be back any minute from wherever it is they've gone, and Katniss wants to at least appear to be asleep before that happens; less likely her mother will insist on Peeta moving. She falls into bed heavily, and Peeta creeps in behind her. His arms cradle under her head and around her waist, tucking her closely into the cocoon of his own generous body heat; at long last some of the irritation and rage she'd felt all day begins to ebb, washing away entirely when his lips press softly underneath her ear.

"You're... You're really not leaving, right? You're really going to stay with me?" she asks him, arching her head backwards to look him in the eye.

He furrows his eyebrows at having to answer this question yet again. But just like always, he kisses her forehead softly and says, "I'm staying right here as long as you'll allow it."

_At least I have Peeta's arms_, she thinks. _And his lips._

—

_Oh, should my people fall_

_Then surely I'll do the same_

_—_

_Katniss is right about one thing_, Gale thinks as he toes his shoes off in the mudroom of his new home, _Madge really is glowing._

Madge is sitting at the piano, one hand idly tinkling the ivory keys while her other strokes her swollen belly. There's an aura around her that Gale always figured was just be the terrific lighting combining with the honey-blonde color of her curls. Women in the Seam don't glow when they're pregnant—their heads hang low, as though they're staring down their bellies and the baby inside. Resentfulness isn't uncommon amongst pregnant Seam women, and their men, too. Gale had certainly felt it when Madge had cornered him to give him their unplanned news. But that was months ago, and plenty has changed since.

She smiles at him cherubically, and pats the bench to bid him join her. He sinks down and kisses her cheek, running his own palm over her stomach in greeting, then watches her with his hands clasped in his lap. _Future Mayors don't cross their arms and scowl_, he'd been reminded again and again. It was a hard habit to break.

"Did you talk to her?" Madge asks, her lithe fingers following a trail entirely of their own across the keys.

"For a second. She, ah… She didn't seem to keen to talk to me, though," he says.

"I could try if you think it would help. We never talked much, she and I, but I could try."

"She's angry at me. She might have a right to be, for all I know. But as long as she's angry, she'll be too damn stubborn to listen."

"Don't swear, Gale," Madge scolds. _Right_, he thinks._ Mayors don't do that, either._

"She'll see, though, I'm sure. Once Daddy steps down and we get to work, she'll see what we're trying to do. Even she's not so stubborn that she won't be able to see what we all can do."

It's everything Gale can do to not actually snort at her. _You don't know Katniss at all, then_, he thinks.

She gasps a second later, and her hands fly from the keys to grab his wrist. She places his palm flat on her stomach and beams at him. "Feel that? I knew the baby liked music. He's been doing that ever since I sat down, but it's so much harder now."

He knows the feeling of a baby kicking—he'd felt three siblings kicking inside their mother, after all—but there is something different when it's a child of your own. He doesn't exactly understand it, but it makes his own heart hasten. A smile tugs at his mouth, and not just the one he's become good at holding for Madge's sake. It's real. Looking at her, feeling this… It's difficult not to be happy in a moment like this.

It's easy to forget that this moment was forged from another so different. He'd been seeing red for hours the day he'd met Madge just past the Hob fence, pulled her to his chest, and kissed her breathless. He had regretted it immediately—he didn't like feeling like an animal, mauling easy prey as it sauntered past in a pretty, pink coat, but she hadn't resisted. In fact, when he pushed her away and muttered an apology he truly meant despite its delivery, she'd called after him.

"I wait seventeen years for you to do that, and then you just walk away?"

Gale didn't think he was the sort of person anyone would wait seventeen years to do something. Katniss certainly hadn't. She'd found another pair of lips she wanted, lips Gale told her that she couldn't trust, but she hadn't listened. His own could not compare with Peeta Mellark's, not where Katniss Everdeen was concerned. But Madge Undersee liked them. She liked _him_. She'd waited for _him_.

There's something undeniably enticing about someone who'll wait for you.

He'd circled back, intent to grab her by the wrist and pull her along the path to the mine slag heaps, but she'd had a different idea. And so their baby, the one kicking at his hand, had been conceived in her plush bed surrounded by downy comforters that felt stifling over his back as he'd thrust in and out of her. She was a virgin; he knew by the way she'd whimpered when he'd first rolled against her and the brownish red stain on his member when he'd pulled out of her. Finishing inside her wasn't a big deal, because he'd had a couple of other girls before who'd been virgins, too, and they hadn't gotten pregnant. It didn't happen that way.

He couldn't help but wonder if there were a lot of things people in the Seam—hell, in the entire District—didn't really know about conception. If they knew, he'd bet there would be a lot fewer resentful parents and hungry mouths to feed. But that isn't the Capitol's plan, and he knows it.

"How are you so certain it's a boy?" Gale asks, bemused.

"The Hawthorne seed seems awfully male to me," she replies with a wink.

"There's Posy."

"Still. I just have a sense, that's all."

It's moments like this, when she's smiling at him, so full of love and adoration, that he thinks that maybe this whole debacle isn't all that bad. He'd figured out months ago that he'd been underestimating the sweet natured Mayor's daughter for years. She has a fire in her, but unlike Katniss's, it's tempered with a calm demeanor and placid spirit. But it's there, smoldering deep inside of her.

He didn't love her when he fucked her. He didn't love her when she'd told him he'd knocked her up. He sure didn't love her when he agreed to a toasting with her. But now, as he leans forward and seals his lips over hers, he decides he does love her.

And whether he wants it to or not, love has a tendency to root in and grow in his heart.

—

_I see fire_

_Inside the mountain_

_—_

Katniss's bow is nocked and primed for a kill. Already, she's mentally allotting the money she'll get for beefy wild boar—money for coal and oil, money for a new coat for Prim, yarn for her mother, a scoop or two of proper flour for Peeta to craft into something other than the mealy tesserae bread he pretends to like just fine for her sake. Maybe, just maybe, she'll even be able to afford a proper wedding present for Peeta; some clay baking dishes, perhaps, or a bit of dandelion wine from Ripper. Expenses like that usually strike her as ridiculous, but for Peeta, who was used to a little bit of luxury, she's willing to make a tiny exception.

She's about to let the arrow fly, hoping it will land true in the animal's spine when a piercing, foreign sound startles them both. It's like a scream, or worse.

Katniss wants to scream with frustration when the boar takes off into the woods, but only until the noise registers in her brain. She's heard it once before, as a child. The sound that meant her father was lost to her forever.

_The alarm for the mines._

"Peeta!" she cries, not caring if she frightens away every animal in a square mile. "Peeta!"

Her feet carry her swiftly to the boundary fence, and she doesn't even check to see if it's electrified before ducking under it and racing for the path that leads out to the mine entrance.

There's already a thick crowd assembled. Peacekeepers are holding them back by beating their whipping sticks against the palms of their hands, but Katniss knows them all and none of them will dare use it. They're just trying to keep people from flooding what already looks to be a triage area out front, judging by the gruesome sights, the noxious smells, and the two blonde women ordering people around. An event like this ought to drive her mother back into a state of complete catatonics, but she and Prim are rushing from injured miner to injured miner, applying bandages, dousing wounds with water, whatever is in their limited ability to do.

"Prim!" Katniss screams, and pushes to the front of the throng to demand to be let through. She barely registers Darius holding the arm of another Peacekeeper who tries to block her path, his sympathetic look through the fringe of red hair that's overgrown into his eyes. Katniss doesn't stop until she gets to Prim's side. She isn't sure what she's expecting from her sister, but it isn't to be roughly pushed away and pointed back to the crowd.

"Get back, Katniss. We need space to work." Prim has never sounded so harsh and clipped before.

"Where's Peeta?!" Katniss pants. "Have they gotten him out yet?!"

"Go back behind the barrier, Katniss! You'll be in the way!"

"Please, Prim, I need to know!"

"Go, Katniss, before I let the Peacekeepers arrest you," Prim snaps.

Prim's harshness belies a cold truth—she doesn't know where Peeta is. And as much as the mines terrify her, have terrified her since she was 11 and lost her father to their clutches, it's everything Katniss can do to not launch herself into its mouth and search for him herself.

"She's right, Katniss. Come on. Come this way," a gentle voice says. Katniss whirls around to meet its source; her eyes narrow when she takes in Madge Under—Hawthorne. She's Madge Hawthorne now.

"I'll do as I please," she hisses to the girl she used to consider her friend.

"Not if they say no," Madge says, nodding to Prim and Mrs. Everdeen. She's practically dragging Katniss now, and with her belly sticking out like it is, Katniss doesn't fight her. She may absolutely loathe the man who put Madge in that way, but she's not going to punch her in the stomach for it. And if she's honest, she's too scared to put up much of a fight now anyway.

_This is why I never wanted to fall in love,_ she tells herself mournfully. _I'll end up just like Mother. I can't live without him. I don't want to live without him._

Madge seems to be trying to spend a moment at the side of each panicked wife and onlooker, but she comes back to Katniss again and again. She presses a cup of water into her hand the first time; on the next round tells Katniss she really ought to drink it; she wrangles a threadbare blanket out of nowhere the next, and drapes it around her shoulders before tucking Katniss into her side. It's then that Katniss notices that Madge is looking at the mine entrance with the same sort of pensive stare.

Of course. Gale must be captaining the rescue mission. He'd worked the mines for two years before he'd knocked Madge up and moved up in the world. He lost a father there, too. Maybe it's not too much to hope that he'd want to save as many lives as he could.

And yet, if he came across Peeta, would he help him? Katniss isn't sure. In the bizarre reality where Gale had some prior claim to Katniss as more than his hunting partner, he'd been furious with her when she'd admitted to seeing Peeta other than the times they traded at the backdoor of the bakery. Gale hadn't understood at all when she told him she'd fallen for Peeta, that Peeta's inherent goodness had won even her cynical heart over. Rich coming from the man who screwed the Mayor's daughter, of course.

Her former best friend might be a complete stranger to her now, but she feels certain that Gale would never condemn a man to die a dark, toxic death if he could help it. So when Madge Hawthorne clutches Katniss's hand, Katniss clings for dear life back.

—

_Blood in the breeze_

_And I hope that you remember me_

_—_

It's gotten dark and eerily quiet when there's a final shout from the mine shaft. Madge, stuck in nearly the same obvious state of crushing grief as the quivering girl in her arms, feels her heart flutter and baby kick when she recognizes the voice. Gale's grey eyes are piercing against the solid coat of black coal covering his skin.

"His heart stopped a minute ago, I don't know if—"

"Peeta!" Katniss screams, and pulls herself free from Madge's arms. Madge clutches her stomach as she chases Katniss across the boundary, joining her mother and sister at the side of the limp body Gale's laying at their feet.

"Peeta, please wake up," Madge hears Katniss beg.

"Katniss, we need room to work," Mrs. Everdeen says sternly. Madge is again the one to pull her former friend away, clutch her to her chest as she sobs.

Madge hasn't ever seen anything quite like the Everdeen women—Prim thumps wildly at the man's still chest, and Mrs. Everdeen dips her face and covers Peeta's mouth with her own. She sees his chest rise, but she knows he's still not breathing. She tears her eyes away from the scene only once, to check that Gale is okay. He's looking at the body just as morosely, panic all over his coal-caked features.

"Please, Peeta…" Katniss whimpers, and Madge strokes her hair.

And then, just as Madge believes the women are about to give up on their future son- and brother-in-law, Peeta Mellark gasps and coughs dryly. Katniss wrenches herself from Madge's arms and dives between her mother and sister, gathering his coughing form to her and holding him like she's clearly terrified of letting go.

"Careful, there's a bit of a cave in," Peeta wrasps. Katniss looks like she's going to hit him at the exact same time she kisses him fiercely instead. Their lips separate with a wet pop, and Madge hears Peeta say lowly, "It's okay. Katniss; you can stop crying, it's okay."

"You were d-dead! You're h-heart s-stopped."

His hand reaches out to caress her face, and his teeth glint white against his ashen face. "It's alright. It's working now."

Madge feels tears on her cheeks at the sight, but she manages to not fully cry until Gale is back at her side, his arms wrapped tight around her shoulders. Neither of them want to turn around and face the myriad of people who now know that while these loved ones have been reunited, there were still too many that couldn't be saved.

And for not the first time, righteous anger boils in Madge's chest.

—

_For if the dark returns_

_Then my brothers will die_

_—_

They've barely gotten Peeta tucked into bed when Katniss flings open the ratty chest of drawers that house all the Everdeen women's clothes. She begins to throw everything she finds—fine and preserved from her mother's merchant days or threadbare and ill-fitting and nearly worn to exhaustion—on the other bed. Peeta opens his exhausted eyes, peering over at her queerly as she works. She can only imagine his throat is too coated in coal dust to speak properly.

It's Prim that finally says something, snaps Katniss out of it for two seconds. "Katniss, what are you—"

"We're leaving," Katniss says, her voice authoritative even as it trembles. "Pack everything we can. As soon as Peeta is strong enough, we're leaving the District."

Her mother speaks with a horrified voice. "Where on earth do you suppose we'd go?"

"I don't care," Katniss snaps. "Anywhere is better than here."

"The woods?" Peeta croaks.

Katniss nods. "For a start. There's bound to be something else out there, something they don't want us to know is there. We'll find it."

"Or we'll die trying," Peeta says morosely.

Katniss rounds the bed, and for a second, her mother and sister think she's going to slap Peeta. She doesn't, but she does take his face in her hands, and shakes him good and hard.

"I'd rather us die together out in the woods than you ever go back there again!" she hisses. "I'm not going to live without you, do you understand me? I refuse. I won't ever let you go down there again, and if we have to live off of twigs and berries until we starve to death, so be it!"

"It was an accident, Katniss. They'll learn from it. It won't happen again, I'm sure of it," Peeta says, trying so hard to calm her even though he knows, in his heart, it's useless.

"Tell that to her!" Katniss shrieks, pointing to her mother. "They didn't learn from years ago, did they, Mother? I'm not going to let this happen again! I'm not going to become you, not if I can help it."

Mrs. Everdeen and Prim, of course, know what Katniss means by the barbs she slings Mrs. Everdeen's way, but Peeta can only struggle to sit up on the stiff mattress and try to collect his thoughts. A tense moment passes between the three women before Mrs. Everdeen throws her hands up in the air and storms out of the room. Prim, trying so hard to keep the peace between them, runs after their mother, and Katniss sinks down on the bed next to Peeta.

She takes his face in her hands—much gentler this time—and finally allows the tears brimming in the corners of her eyes to spill down her cheeks. He wouldn't think she'd have any tears left after a day like today. "Peeta please," she begs. "You didn't know, you couldn't know because I hid it, but my mother almost died herself when my father died. That's why I didn't ever want to love anyone, not ever, because I couldn't stand to ever feel the way she did. But I do love you that much, and if you stop living, I stop living. Don't you get that? Don't you get how much I need you?"

She's making these terrifying choking noises, reminiscent of an animal dying, but she makes no effort to stop them. She can see the pain in his azure eyes, and she knows if she can just coax him a little harder, that maybe he'll give in to her demands.

"I can't live without you," she sobs. "Please don't make me. Please, don't ever go back down there again. Come with me and we can make it, I swear. I promise you we'll make it. Please, Peeta, please…"

"Okay, okay!" he says, and cups her trembling jaw in his hands to pull her close. He still smells of sweat and blood and coal dust, but he's so solid, so steady, so there. It's impossible not to be completely taken with just how there he is. "We'll do it," he whispers, combing his fingers through her matted hair. "We'll do it."

"Thank you," she cries, and clings to him.

They hold one another for ages, both too terrified for the moment they might have to let go that they fall asleep in one another's embrace. And when Katniss dreams, she dreams of the place she'd promised him—somewhere they can, and always will be, safe.

—

_Watch the flame burn auburn on the mountain side_

_Desolation comes upon the sky_

—

Katniss extricates herself from Peeta's arms in the early hours of the morning, making sure not to wake him, or her mother and Prim in the next bed. On a morning like this, she'd usually slip straight out into the woods and try to track down their supper and enough to trade for the necessities; that'll come, too, of course, but not before more important matters.

She decides that while Peeta is recovering, she'll take whatever she can in her hunting bag out to the cabin by the lake. It's as good a place as any to set up camp for a little while, so long as they're discrete with fires. It's far enough from the District that few people would know to traverse that far, and hidden enough that anyone who might be searching from above might not notice it right away. It won't be ideal for the long term, of course, but it'll do for a time while she figures out where they'll go next.

She pulls on a few extra layers of clothing, items belonging to different members of her family, in order to stash bulkier objects in her bag, but doesn't make it out the door before she sees a shadow looming across the porch. Her eyes narrow and her expression turns sour. She knows deep down that she owes Gale Hawthorne for Peeta's life, but it doesn't make her hate the sight of him any less.

"Where you heading, Catnip?" Gale whispers, pointing to her bulky bag. Others might not notice how full it is before a hunt, but he would.

"None of your damn business, Mr. Mayor. If you'll excuse me…"

He doesn't call out—that would wake the neighbors, and the miners get such precious little sleep to begin with. She storms towards her usual entry spot for the woods and with a quick look, slips under the fence and begins the long trudge towards the cabin that she's hoping to make their salvation.

—

_And with that shadow upon the ground_

_I hear my people screaming out_

—

She returns towards the middle of the day. A couple of rabbits have made their way into the snare lines, and they'll make good enough stew, even if they are a little scrawny. If she were thinking beyond getting Peeta fed and strong, she might find it interesting that seeing Gale that morning and finding game in the almost-useless snares happened on the same day. Gale Hawthorne is the furthest thing from her mind, though, until she sees his face when she enters her home.

He's sitting next to Peeta on the ratty old couch. Peeta's wrapped in the thickest quilt they own, and she'd be lying if she didn't admit that next to the strapping, bulkier, and certainly cleaner Gale, Peeta looks oddly small and frail. How only a few months of the men switching sides of the District has effected the pair of them strikes her as un-humorously funny.

"Mr. Mayor… What an honor," she snarks, and shoots daggers at him with her own steely eyes.

"Stop, Katniss. He's here to talk to us both," Peeta says, his voice calm and measured.

"He's not welcome in my house," she hisses, and takes a sick pride in how it looks like it stings Gale to hear.

"Then we won't be here long," another voice says, but it's not one she'd expect. Still glowing, even through her dour expression, is Madge Hawthorne.

"What do the two of you want? Some sort of payment for saving Peeta's life? You fucking know we don't have anything," Katniss says coldly. "Leave us be."

"We'd never ask something like that," Madge says, her voice steady.

"Then leave. Us. Be."

"They want to help, Katniss," Peeta says, and this is finally what rattles her resolve. "They want to… They want to fight."

"Fight what? The Capitol? Why would they, when they live so perfectly—?"

Katniss's eyes bulge when she feels Madge's forearm press into her throat. The pregnant woman throws her weight against her, knowing full well the advantage her belly has between them to keep Katniss from struggling.

"Madge!" Gale hisses. "Stop."

"You aren't a fool, Katniss," Madge says, her grip loosening only enough so that Katniss can breathe. "I know the Seam thinks it's sunshine and daisies in Town, but I know you aren't that sort of fool. It's bad everywhere. It's bad in every District, everywhere but the Capitol. My father, the other mayors, they've been too afraid to fight. They've been too cowed to try and make a difference. Gale and I won't be that way, and he's been trying to tell you so for weeks. But you know as well as we do that people won't listen to us—_you_ won't, so why would anyone else?"

Madge steps back, tosses her curls over her shoulder, and straightens the lace blouse she wears. Then she grasps Katniss's wrist with her fingers and presses something cold and oddly sharp into her palm.

"We need voices. We need to stand together or there's no hope of anything changing. We," Madge looks significantly at Gale, "aren't the enemy, Katniss. You know who the real enemy is."

Katniss's jaw trembles, but she's stunned silent. There's something in Madge's face that reflects the anger she feels everyday. She'd underestimated the sweet, quiet Mayor's daughter. She knows that in an instant.

"We have time to plan. But we need your help. So when you've decided to stop being stubborn, you know where to find us. We'll be waiting."

Madge steps back and holds her hand out to Gale. The couple share a terse look with Katniss, and a cordial nod to Peeta. Then they're gone, as fast as Madge had struck.

Peeta gets off the couch, the quilt falling to his feet as he wraps his arms around Katniss's waist.

"You okay? I didn't think Madge had that in her," he asks, kissing her temple, her cheek, her lips.

"F-Fine."

"What'd she give you? What is that?"

Katniss hinges open her fingers and stares down at her palm. The cold metal glints gold, and she realizes the bit that'd felt like it'd pricked her thumb is the tip of a tiny arrow.

She's not sure if Peeta knows the stories—the legend of what was never supposed to exist that turned around and thrived. It's not a story many know, and only because she remembers the bits and pieces in her father's soothing voice does she even know it's not something she's made up in her own scrambled, confused head.

"Katniss? What is it?"

"It's a mockingjay."

—

_And I see fire burn auburn on the mountain side_

—


End file.
